


Only One Drop

by Shaded Mazoku (Ashkaztra)



Series: Bloodborne [1]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Community: spook_me, Gen, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-27
Updated: 2011-10-27
Packaged: 2017-10-25 00:14:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/269493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ashkaztra/pseuds/Shaded%20Mazoku
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One drop is never enough.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Only One Drop

**Author's Note:**

> Written for spook_me 2011. The prompt was “vampire”. John is always my favourite victim

She was the most beautiful woman John had ever seen, and in retrospect, that should have tipped him off, because nobody that beautiful were ever up to anything good. But he hadn’t listened to the sceptical part of his brain and now he was paying the price.

The sunlight burned his skin and cracked it open, and she was thrashing and screaming in his arms, but he didn’t plan on letting go. He managed to get in the shade somehow while kicking her into the clearing, where the sun was unhindered by the heavy canopy. For a moment, she stared at him with wide eyes and she was so beautiful it hurt, and he wanted nothing more than to rush to her side, and then she snarled at him as she burst into flame, screaming her fury to the sky.

Only ashes were left of her by the time the others arrived, Ronon throwing a heavy woollen blanket over John’s head that provided some blessed relief from the sun.

He could hear Teyla promising Rodney it would be all right now.

John wished he could believe her.

*

Locked in his rooms on Atlantis, he was beginning to understand things he’d hoped he never would.

Hunger truly did feel like burning alive, and there wasn’t enough water in the seas of New Lantea to quench the fire. They’d given him food, but it felt like ash in his mouth, dry and tasteless. Water did nothing, either, just reminded him that his stomach was so empty it burned.

*

The others came and went, bringing empty promises and food he could barely stand the sight of. John forced himself to ignore them, because if he noticed, all he could hear was the beating of their hearts, pumping warm, sweet blood through their veins.

Keller came once, to take samples to try find a cure he doubted was possible. She wore her hair up, and John spent the entire time staring at the spot of her neck where the arteries were closest to the surface, feeling like a total creep. The relief on her face when she left was nothing to the relief he felt.

He hadn’t hurt anyone.

Not that time.

But he was only getting hungrier, and nothing seemed to help, and it hurt so much he could barely think.

*

He didn’t mean to bite Ronon.

He really didn’t.

But the others didn’t dare come in any more, and someone had to retrieve more samples, so Ronon had volunteered to hold him still while Carson got the blood-work.

John tried to be good, tried to resist, but Ronon’s arm was crossing his chest, and the sound of his blood and his heartbeat was so loud John thought his head would explode.

The blood was so sweet on his tongue, warm and metallic, washing the pain and hunger away, and John suspected Ronon let him drink for a while before pulling away, because that was just the kind of person Ronon was.

In the end, John was the one to let go, fleeing his actions to hide in the bedroom Rodney had programmed Atlantis to create sun shields for.

John wished he hadn’t bothered.

*

Nobody came to see him any more.

He was only surprised they hadn’t thrown him in the Wraith cell yet.

He’d lost track of how long it had been since someone had last come to see him. It didn’t really matter any more. There was no more talk of a cure, no more medical check-ups. His friends didn’t dare to come see him.

He didn’t want them to, either. Not like that, more out of control than any Wraith he had ever met. Not with the memory of what Ronon’s blood tasted like still fresh in his mind.

*

The room was dark, lights turned off in a desperate attempt to not see the reflective surfaces in his room. But he saw just as well in the dark, and he couldn’t hide from the empty mirror and glass.

There weren’t many left unbroken now.

He’d punched the mirror so hard the wall had dented, and his skin had healed around the shards buried in his hand like they weren’t even there. They were, though, still embedded in his skin, a permanent reminder of what he’d become.

*

Teyla came, once, guards at her back, and demanded they stay outside as she spoke to him.

John had to force himself to stay as far away as possible, but he did try to listen. She glowed so prettily in the dark room, all blood and life and fire, and he wanted to drink it all in like he’d never wanted anything.

He couldn’t understand her words. It was impossible to concentrate with her blood singing in his ears, a siren’s song of vitality and warmth.

She seemed to understand that, because she fell silent, just watching him for a long time.

John wanted to speak, wanted to apologize, to ask for help, to beg. Anything.

“Hurts,” was all he managed.

The sadness on Teyla’s face told him so much more than her words had.

“I know,” she said, finally, and left him there.

*

There were voices outside the door, but John couldn’t tell them apart, only that there were both men and women. He didn’t have the strength to move any more, so he couldn’t get closer, to listen.

It felt good to know he hadn’t been abandoned and forgotten yet, though he still wished he had. There was no reason for his friends to have to suffer along with him.

The door opened.

Even if John had wanted to escape, he couldn’t have, and the light was too bright, hurting his eyes and making him ache all over again. Filtered sunlight still hurt, but it couldn’t kill him, even weakened as he was.

“One last gambit,” someone said, someone John thought might be Woolsey, and his voice was unnaturally loud in the silence of the room.

The door closed again.

John barely had the energy to wonder what the point was.

And then he realised he was no longer alone.

Humans, to him, felt bright and warm, and their blood sung out loud. Whatever was in the room was not bright; not warm, and the sound of blood was slow and deep, a dirge more than a love song.

The arm that pushed down on him was cool, cool and too strong, but he could still smell the blood pulsing through it, and the wrist pressing against his lips was an open invitation.

When he bit, the blood filling his mouth was not what he had expected, cooler and somehow different in taste than Ronon’s, though still metallic. Still delicious.

Strength instantly beginning to recover, John wrapped his arms around the arm he was feeding from and drank deeply, blood filling his stomach and his senses at the same time, until all he was aware of was the slow, steady beat of a heart that seemed unaffected by his feeding. He was only vaguely aware of another hand touching his, carefully opening the wounds the jagged mirror shards had once caused to remove the fragments. Something told him he should pay attention, but it was impossible while feeding like that, the blood flowing into his mouth all he could think about.

Eventually, but still far too soon, the arm was pulled away, with a strength that matched John’s own, now that his system was flush with blood. He growled, but there was no hesitation, no giving in.

John didn’t need to feed more. His stomach was full and his strength was returning, but he still wanted more, wanted to latch on and gorge himself until there was no blood left to drink.

He curled up on the bed instead, wiping his mouth clean with his hand. His hand was stained with black as he did.

And John understood then.

“You were right,” he said, curling up closer, fighting off the drowsiness of a full stomach and a strange feeling of almost equality they have never shared before.

“One drop of water is never enough.”


End file.
